


Time Moves In One Direction, Memory In Another

by Cinco



Category: Being Erica
Genre: Feels, Future Fic, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-21
Updated: 2013-12-21
Packaged: 2018-01-05 08:32:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,392
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1091812
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cinco/pseuds/Cinco
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post canon, Erica and Dr. Tom ruminate. Brief mentions of Adam/Erica and Amanda/Tom.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Time Moves In One Direction, Memory In Another

**Author's Note:**

  * For [a tattered rose (atr)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/atr/gifts).



Doctors weren't supposed to have favorite patients. At least, Tom had always been pretty sure they weren't. He’d never been Naadiah's favorite patient, he was sure; a lot of the time he hadn’t thought she liked him very much. She was proud of his progress, sure, and she valued his insight. But even in his last years as a therapist he’d made serious mistakes, and they’d never moved beyond the dynamic they’d begun with. Tom had remained the student to Naadiah’s master up to the end. It really had never bothered him; he didn't find it necessary to like his own patients, although he usually did. Tom has come far enough to not regard himself as a disappointment, and to realize that most students don’t surpass their teachers. He thinks that maybe, if he’d been a better doctor, he wouldn’t have had a favorite patient. But he did.

Erica is different. She was Tom's 23rd patient, and her problems had seemed fresh even though Tom had known objectively that they were just regular human problems. She was bright, interesting, insightful, and literary-minded like himself. The connection they had had wasn't like the relationships he'd had with his other patients. Tom had liked most of them and some of them had liked Tom. But it was only Erica he regretted leaving behind, only Erica he could only barely bring himself to tell about his retirement. He had told Adam three days before Erica, and had felt exactly no stress or dread beyond Adam’s relationship to Erica and the risk that Adam might tell Erica himself. But Tom had handled that neatly, had warned Adam that he would tell Erica in his own time and that they would be free to discuss his decision together if either of them needed help in processing it. It would be a change in both their lives, obviously, he'd said to Adam, but it didn’t need to be a bad one. All the while his mouth had been moving, he'd known it would be a bad change for Erica and himself both—but a necessary change all the same.

In every other respect but for leaving Erica, Tom knew his decision to retire from therapy was absolutely the right one. He was ready to move on, to start a new chapter in his life and to concentrate fully on Amanda and on his normal timeline. His certainty that this was the right path had been bone-deep, as solid as every other good choice he’d made in his life—taking Naadiah’s offer came to mind. Amanda had deserved no less than his full attention and investment, not just to compensate for the pain he’d caused her during their marriage but to honor how much he loved her, when he made the decision and now, further along in their future together. He had wanted, still wants, to be there for her with his whole self, not whatever was left over after being a full-time time-travel therapist. Tom will never understand how Nadiaa did it; he had known that his work as a therapist would preclude his ability to be wholly present and intimate with Amanda. But even given his total certainty at the time, he had still dreaded telling Erica. And he'd scared her when he did tell her, had handled it badly and hadn't known why. Her emotions in that moment had only mirrored his own, and he’d always regretted the pain he’d caused her in it. It just wasn't a regret that he would fix in therapy, even if he still could.

*

Erica, standing there in the hallway of doors to all her own alternate lives, couldn't help but imagine what it would be like to walk through the door where Dr. Tom hadn't retired, hadn’t left therapy. She knew in her heart that he would have been increasingly unhappy. That he would have left at some point anyway out of desperation, that it was better that he'd gone on his own schedule. But a part of her still wanted to have had more time with him; almost by any means necessary. Seeing his office again, seeing Dr. Tom himself again--at the age she had known him best--had awakened all those old feelings in her: loss, sadness, and genuine happiness for him and understanding of why he needed to move on.

Erica didn't usually visit her younger self, as a rule, and her visits to her own past--while not entirely over, therapists still needed therapy sometimes too--had slowed considerably. As a time-travelling therapist it was hard to say anything for certain, but it was unlikely she'd see much more of her Dr. Tom; Sarah's Toms were very different than Erica's, and Sarah needed her very seldom anymore. 

During her first years with Sarah, Erica had seen Dr. Tom more than a few times. Erica had probably been a little too permissive about letting Sarah revisit good times she'd shared with her parents just because Erica had enjoyed seeing young, happy Tom so much. She'd even interacted with him herself in Sarah's past, as a barista or a shoe salesgirl or a waitress--just as Dr. Tom had interacted with her and the people in her life when he'd been her doctor. It had been bittersweet at best; he had usually been impatient, rude, or downright nasty to her during the handful of times she'd been in her guises in Sarah's past. 

It had always been clear that Sarah's father was not Erica's Dr. Tom. He never once quoted anything to Erica in the past, for one thing, although he had used quotes while parenting Sarah; Erica had heard them from her lips often enough during their therapy and had always known where Sarah had heard them. The first quote Sarah had used had come as a shock, an almost physical experience, as it had come only a few months after Dr. Tom and his office had disappeared and the loss was still new. It was easier each time, and after a year of having Sarah as a patient Erica came to love those glimpses into Dr. Tom-that-was. The best ones, of course, were the sweet and poignant quotes, where it was clear how much he'd cared about Sarah--but Erica savored even the not-so-nice ones. She'd known lots of sides of Dr. Tom, after all.

*

Sarah had been sober for two years when she finally called her father. She hadn't told Erica she was going to do it--sobriety hadn't entirely changed her impulsivity--but Erica had hoped she might soon. It was December, and the flash came when Erica was making dinner at the long counter in the kitchen as the sunset painted the whole flat with gold. When the flash was over, Erica found that Adam was at her side, having come in from the other room to turn the sink tap off for her. They were both very used to her flashes, though thankfully with time she'd managed to learn how not to drop expensive things or trip over her own feet when she resurfaced from them. Occasionally something like the continually-running water would tip Adam off, but most of the other people in Erica's life had just accepted that she was somewhat clumsy. She'd been time travelling for over seven years, after all, and she hadn't been a paragon of grace even beforehand.

Before Adam could ask her if she was all right, Erica put her hand over his where it rested on the edge of the counter. "Give me a minute," she said, quietly.

He smiled and put his arms around her, and she relaxed into them and took a few deep breaths.

Adam didn't worry even when a tear rolled down her cheek; he'd seen her emotional after a flash more than a few times. "I'm okay," Erica confirmed, and then turned in his arms so her back was to the sink and then curled her arms around Adam's neck. "Sarah went to see Dr. Tom." There were tears in her eyes, but she was smiling. "They both feel good about it. It wasn't a long visit, but he was overjoyed to see her, Adam, so intensely relieved--" her voice cracked and she trailed off. "I'm so happy for them."

Adam smiled back and then hugged her close. 

**Author's Note:**

> Merry Yuletide! The title is a William Gibson quote--though of course it's not precisely accurate for Erica and Tom.


End file.
